Seth Godin recently quoted a woman responsible for running a community college who said this at a seminar he attended:
“Well, the bad news,” she said, “is that we have to let everyone in. And the truth is, many of these kids just can’t be the leaders you’re describing, can’t make art. We need people to do manual work, and it’s those people.”
Yikes. Here’s what Godin said:
“I couldn’t believe it. I was speechless, then heartbroken. All I could think of was these young adults, trusting this woman to lead them, teach them, inspire them and push them, and instead being turned into ‘those people.'”
Maybe I’m drawn to this woman’s ignorance a little more because I’ve spent a large chunk of my last seven years teaching at a community college. I’ve taught at four colleges and universities, but my favorite experience is C.C.A.C. because of all the diversity. The faces turnover semester to semester, and each new class is filled with all kinds of people from around the world. You never know who’s who, and students from 17 to 70 years old surprise in a number of positive ways.
Yes, it’s easy to become exasperated over those who are chronically careless but putting them in the category of hopeless is cold and wrong.
Then again, I know plenty of educators and administrators who checked out long ago. They’re not in it for the love of anything noble anymore. Some of them are constantly disgusted by their academic audiences. They’re jaded.
I’m especially sensitive to cold-hearted disregard like this because for much of my life–particularly as a student at a state college–I would most definitely have been placed in the category of “those people” by the shortsighted woman who Godin ran into.
Thank God so many great teachers believed in me, valued my personhood, and showed me how to be better.
Here’s Godin’s summation because he’s smarter than me.
“When those that we’ve chosen to teach and lead write off people because of what they look like or where they live or who their parents are, it’s a tragedy. Worse, we often write people off merely because they’ve been brainwashed into thinking that they have no ability to do more than they’ve been assigned. Well, if we brainwashed them into setting limits, I know we can teach them to ignore those limits.”
10 replies on “THOSE People”
It really isn’t limited to community college though, right? We are all THOSE people to someone. And someone is always THOSE people to us. We have to fight for that to not happen to us.
Definitely a mindset/challenge that goes beyond any one place.
So are one of those people who aren’t as smart as Godin?
🙂
I think there’s a difference in being “chronically careless” and what she says are kids who “just can’t be the leaders you’re looking for”. The first is a chosen attitude and the second represents almost a removal of choice. In that setting, “can’t” is a strong accusation, and deciding someone else can’t is inexcusable.
How many stories are there of educators lifting their students up to levels never before expected of them, because they either believed those people could do more or because they were not told that those people were a group of students who can’t?
The sad thing is that most of us live up to or sink down to whatever is expected of us. And I wonder if that woman can hide her expectations from “those people” she seemingly disdains.Her words really upset me because it’s not right to decide someone else’s potential.
On the other hand, I’m basing my reaction a lot on Seth’s interpretation of her words, but that’s only a snippet of what she said. Perhaps what she meant was that you really do have to be realistic and understand that for some students, no matter how hard they work, they will never achieve a level of mastery. But (for example) though they won’t ever be artists, there is still a place for them in the art world. And that makes sense. But by saying “the bad news is” we’ve got to work with these people too, she’s made her thoughts pretty clear.
I think you said it. Especially, in that setting, there’s nothing right about deciding who can’t do what.
In reading this, I couldn’t help thinking of Ross Perot’s (in)famous gaffe:
“You people.”
You, those, etc–when used as labels–all suck, and need to DIAF. Because there’s only people. James is instructive here in his admonishments about the well-dressed, the homeless, and playing favorites: this ought not to be.
As someone who’s in charge of leading people, I’ve learned that there’s no such thing as “those people”. Andy Stanley said it well that there’s no difference between people at one successful institution and those at a less successful place other than the leadership.
If I don’t look at myself and how I’m leading first… shame on me!
Great post.
It’s amazing how many leaders don’t understand that their job is to lead.
AHHHH! She sounds like a classroom refugee, fleeing teaching (ironically to lead) because she couldn’t handle it. There are many classroom refugees in admin positions. Unfortunately.
Child, teens, and young adults are experts in detecting “bullsh*t” in adults. They can sense whether an adult likes them or not in mere seconds. My own son has this sense, as do all my students. They talk about other teachers who they feel “don’t like kids.” Of course, these same teens have trouble detecting “bullsh*t” amongst their peer group, but they have us adults down.
Great post.